UKIP Watch: trawling for ‘fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists’ standing in the local elections

DAVID Cameron called UKIP “fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists”. In another age, he might have called them prospective voters. As the local elections loom, sections of the press are focusing on UKIP. The coerage is not always fair. They are looking beyond UKIP leader Nigel Farage, the head-shaking politician whose incredulity at life is evidenced in his way of speaking in lists, a man who could describe cup of coffee as “It’s brown, it’s foreign, it’s bad for you and it has no place on British life.”

Let’s see what the press has come up with so far:

The Telegraph produced this:

Sushil Patel

Gis daughter is Priti Patel, the Conservative MP. Mr Patel is standing in the Bushey South division of the Hertfordshire County Council.

Though I had no intention of writing again about the absurdity of the anti-Ukip stories being circulated in the media, this one is too funny not to mention. For the full story you must visit my brother Dick’s blog post...

Dick writes in the Telegraph:

It’s no secret that I’m currently standing as a Ukip candidate for the forthcoming council elections. What was a secret until now is my Nazi past. As the photo above proves beyond doubt, I was present at one of Hitler’s rallies. I was also clearly part of an early cloning experient. And in case you hadn’t yet worked it out, this is all utter nonsense. But it has been seized upon by my Tory opponent in Thursday’s local election.

Moments after tweeting the above image with the words “I’d better get rid of this old Facebook photo before the Tories get hold of it” I received a phone call from a local hack. It went something like this:
Hack: “Simon [my Tory opponent, and incumbent councillor] is afraid that you’re a Nazi.”
Me: “But it’s a parody of Conservative Central Office trawling through Ukip candidates’ Facebook pages. Why do you suppose they’re doing that?”
Hack: “To dig up dirt.”
Me: “So Simon’s just doing what he’s been told by head office.”
Hack: “No, he seems genuinely upset. You see, he doesn’t do Twitter, so he might not understand. I think he really believes the photo.”
Me: “But I wasn’t even around in 1940! And… there are three of me.”
So in a bit of a sweat I hastily deleted the tweet. Then thought about all the other pictures I have on Facebook. Were there any of me with guns or knives?

Anna-Marie Crampton

She’s standing for council election in East Sussex.

Crampton was suspended by the eurosceptic party ahead of next week’s local elections after comments attributed to her were posted on a conspiracy theory website questioning who was responsible for the Holocaust during the Second World War.

“Holocaust means a sacrifice by fire. Only the Zionists could sacrifice their own in the gas chambers,” Crampton allegedly wrote.

“The Second World Wide War was engineered by the Zionist Jews and financed by the banksters to make the general public all over the world feel so guilty and outraged by the Holocaust that a treaty would be signed to create the State of Israel as we know it today.”

UKIP said:

While she will still be on the ballot paper as a Ukip candidate we want voters in her district to realise that she is not representing the party and the people of east Sussex,” said a spokesperson.

“Rest assured that her views are not held by the party and do not reflect the views of our other excellent candidates.”

She tweeted:

“I’m NOT antisemitic. I NEVER said I do not believe in the holocaust. I’ve clearly been trolled. I do post on Zionism as a political movement”

Mr Scotton, backs a number of controversial groups on his Facebook page.

This includes him ‘liking’ the official page for the controversial far-right organisation English Defence League.

He has also ‘liked’ Facebook groups which include ‘Racism? No mate it’s just ethnic banter’, ‘No more mosques in Britain’ and ‘I hate it when I lose my black friend in the dark.’

John Sullivan

John Sullivan, the party’s candidate for the Newent division in Thursday’s county council elections, was alleged to have made anti-gay comments on Facebook. Gay Star News addressed his remarks after one of its readers spotted them online. Gay Star News accused Mr Sullivan of claiming in a post that regular physical exercise ‘prevents’ children from ‘becoming’ gay and the Victorian method of physical exercise ‘released tension and thus avoided homosexuality’.

The Times reported on Saturday that Alan Ryall who was the party’s candidate in Wickham (he quit after the story broke) admitted to membership of the BNP for “one or two years” but now “found it too extreme”. The Times also uncovered Peter Lucas in Devon who was listed as a “student member of the BNP” but he denies this. As does Chris Byrne standing in leafy Surrey; “That wasn’t me” he claims.

Backebencher: There is a quote on the EDL’s Facebook page which states: “I think all nationalist parties should stand aside in areas that UKIP have a good chance of winning. Lets not split their vote. We might take a couple or a few hundred votes of them, we don’t come no where and we’ve cost UKIP the win because they come 50,60 votes behind Labour.” Is that the EDL endorsing UKIP?

Robinson: ‘Yeah. What parties are there? I always get asked this about why the EDL got into politics. It is all set against you – it is impossible to do without millions of pounds funding, etc etc. Now who is going to change what is happening is this country from the point of immigration and Islam? I remember a speech Lord Pearson done 2 years ago, he was the ex leader of UKIP…(Google dialogue)…where he questioned about the EDL, and everything he said in his speech about what is happening to this country about the demographics of Islam, and the Muslim birth rate, and the threat to the nation – I remember watching that and thinking “bang he has got it on the head; he’s hitting every nail on the head, I agree with everything he is saying.” But to hear a well educated; say for example my own mother doesn’t agree with what I stand for; but when I show like Lord Pearson saying what we are saying, because they are saying exactly what we say, just in a different way – do you know what I mean?’

And then the barrel was scraped.

Bradley Monk

A UKIP candidate has posted snaps of himself online as shamed pervert Jimmy Savile, The Sun can reveal. Bradley Monk, 19, wore a Savile mask to a Halloween party as the scandal over the DJ’s paedophile past raged last year.

The politics student is standing in Hampshire County Council seat Winchester Eastgate tomorrow.

Our revelation of the Facebook photos fuels the growing furore over who UKIP is allowing to stand…

Confronted by The Sun, Monk grovelled last night: “It was meant as a harmless joke. I’m in no way endorsing Savile — what he did was disgusting.”

On the positive side for UKIP, we can now name other party members other than the ubiquitous Farage…

It is clear there is a determined campaign underway to smear UKIP by highlighting a few spurious absurdities in connection with a very small number of their candidates. They are fielding over 1700 candidates in these elections and nothing has been said of the vast majority of these in the way of smears.
There is far more reason to deride and ridicule the present coalition government, many members of whom are either corrupt, awaiting trial or are in jail or just plain stupid. That is where the real focus of attention should be rather than an aspiring party who have the interests of this nation as a priority rather than the rest of the world.

when they come out with a comprehensive range of policies (not just expelling all immigrants) which might actually help run the country effectively, then they might received the focus of attention they are so desperate for….
nothing has been said about the majority of the 1700 candidates because they in turn seem to have not very much to say….
anyone can stand for election – the Monster Raving Loonies did it for years – it doesn’t make them fit to run the country.